The five competitive forces that shape strategy

Here is an interview with famous Harvard Prof Michael Porter. The interview was made during 2008 and he discuss his new updated article about the "five forces framework". It is very interesting to listen to him, and actually see him talk about this ubiquitous framework. Very much worth the time!

Blog at HBR

I recently read this great blog by Scott Anthony at HBR. The blog is called "Innovation Insights" and it's a great site for getting a hold of new important technical information. It's great, and the link is here.

On the case of Wal-Mart...

... here you can see the history of their logo-types... and here is the link to the blog that writes about historical logo-types. Really cool.

Finally.. one down, one to go..

Finally, the group is done with the marketing project.. Now, I only have one more hand-in to do.. an analysis of the fantastic company Wal-Mart.. when I write fantastic, i dont mean the goods that they have.. but their extraordinary financial strength.. its extreme, and very impressive. Danm, Im so tired.

Be cool, stay in school

I have no time to write any long messages since Im currently writing on two projects.. Other than that, im looking forward to the US election. Look here for polls, and Washington Post for good articles of first hand material and solid analysis.

Funny cartoon from CNN

I went onto cnn.com and saw this funny carton made by Bob Lang.

Friday.. 2.18 AM

... and I'm off to bed.. too bad this is going to happen tomorrow as well..

These hand-ins..

... are taking a lot of time.. no time to gather financial information on the web.. no time to blog. Oh, I will enjoy some free evenings next week - i hope. Its 2.54 AM and I'm off to bed to listen to some of this. Its been a very fast week.. and so hectic.

Hectic week

This is turning out to be the most hectic week since I moved here.

This is the most impressive thing i have ever seen..

I am currently looking at the balance sheet and P&L of Wal-Mart from 1993 to 2005. It is clearly one of the most impressive things I have EVER seen. Its astounding, breathtaking and beautiful. Take a look at it here or here.

Harvard Business Review...

I was thinking that getting a subscription at the HBR when Im done with my MBA.. since you are gaining such an information momentum, getting a subscription would be a very easy way to gain access to the newest and most comprehensive academic information and research.

International subscription. (Costs approximately SEK 999/year)
Swedish / Nordic subscription. (Costs approximately SEK 1430 / year)

Why would anyone choose to subscribe from a Swedish website? moronic. Well, Im going to get a subscription.. a lot of very good articles comes from this magazine.

One of my absolute favourite quotes...

I have this great quote from a theoretic article in Interfaces in 1984:

"...estimating cash flows properly is more important than fine tuning the discount rate..."

Stuart C. Myers

New week and presentation of Icelandic banks

Well, I was at a corporate fair the other week and got a hold of some very interesting information about the Icelandic bank Landsbanki. Take a look at the presentation material... I wonder how the bank currently functions as of now..

• PPT from Landsbanki
• PDF from Landsbanki

The new week has started with a lecture in accounting, and its very good as usual. I'm waiting fora comment by Hanno here.. The Stockholm Exchange is up 600 points as of now, only down 4000 points since January first, yahoo!

The first good article about the financial crisis - on the Swedish newspaper site, DN.se.

Strategy case and book about Wal-Mart

I have found this very interesting book: its called The Wal-Mart Effect and its written by Charles Fishman.. I have read about two thirds, and its very rewarding.

If you combine that book with the documentary, Wal-Mart: The high cost of low price... you will get a fairly unbiased picture of the company - i think. It is very hard not to get impressed.

Here is another interesting article from the magazine, the New Yorker about Wal-Mart and their tarnished reputation.

Buy the book? (its about SEK 170 a these different sites)
Link to Adlibris.
Link to Capris (Norway).
Link to Amazon.co.uk.

Micro and game theory

We are now having lectures in micro economics again.. which is nice. We are going to go through game theory and a couple of practical problems. Im also going to Stockholm today... It has been a really interesting week, especially on the financial side. Icelandic banks going bust.. several school hand ins and interest rate cuts - Talked with a friend in London two days ago and he concluded what we all know... "well, the party is definitely over for this time". Im pretty sure what is going down now, wont restrict anyone next time we will se a financial bubble or similar behavior.

Im so tired..

Damn, im so tired.

Strategy and disruptive technologies..

We are now discussing "blue ocean strategy" and Kodak - we believe that its a clear case of disruptive technology entrance. It started as an article in Harvard Business Review and its a very interesting concept of thinking.

The blue ocean strategy concept is also very interesting.. Value nets and so on (not to be confused with earlier mentioned value networks).

New book by Lowenstein.

Here is the link to the new Lowenstein.. I really really want this one. Ill buy it as soon as i can.
"While America Aged"

Here is the book review in NY Times.

Interesting article and short movie about Lehman Bros

Found this article about the interrogation of Dick Fuld (CEO of Lehman Bros) - and here is another one. Apparently, he and his management team did not have a clue about what they had on their balance sheet. Very weird - but it brought them down. Here is the video link to the testimony on Youtube.com. Very view-worthy!

In the short movie, David Weidner has some very interesting points and pointers that could be applied to the Scandinavian markets. Look at this article as well..

Lehman also seemed to value some of their assets at 100 %, when their competitors valued the same asset to 65 % of the face value. Talk about raping your balance sheet. Very weird, and interesting.

The night

Ok, its a quarter to one and I managed to create a new mind map of the the new IT article. Felt some flashbacks of IBM swoosh by my eyes. Well, Im really tired but cant help to think about the debate between McCain and Obama.. lets see, the Pollster.com report says.. 320 electoral votes to Obama (which is more than the needed 270! - wonder what happens in the near future). Too bad i cant watch the debate - would be interesting to see.. G'nite

Very late night, or early morning..

I had a very late night yesterday... I think I went to bed at around 4 o clock - saw some of the movements on the NYSE before I went to bed. We also had a very rewarding group seminar today, which I think will improve the group output a lot.

Work all night and reports from hell..

Well, it seems as if markets collapsed today - big time.. The value of many of the Icelandic banks - disappeared, the Swedish stock exchange dropping more than 700 points.. the Dow being in some kind of free fall.. and Lehman's Dick Fuld blaming the termination of "his" bank on rumors. Well, what can you say.. I personally think that it was the risky positions that brought down Lehman and the fact that many of the financial securities lacked any substantial backing..

I mean, in a system where you can just deliver your house (the asset backing the financial security) to the bank if you cannot make your payments (and the loaners debt is terminated), and the bank sitting on the joker of the deck.. then.. i think it was this system of intricate and somewhat foolish behavior (including the Triple-A rating of many CDO's - which made many think that they invested in something risk free, when in fact - it wasnt) of their investments that actually brought them down. I assume that Fuld would like to think something else. I remember that I had a conversation with a guy from a very famous information database that told me that he had once worked for Lehman, and that they more or less just had waited for them to go bust - for several years. I mean, something must have distorted the culture of Lehman Bros. Especially when G.S seems to have sailed through the rain of blood that is currently pouring on Wall Street (its like the movie Carrie, but in real life.. and with a street). There was also this pompous idiot in the Swedish media who felt sorry for Lehman brothers - because there were so many great people there. Shut up fool, let the market do the job - and I'm pretty sure the really talented people there can get a job - even in the darkest recession the earth has ever seen.. Only three hours more work, then Ill go to bed.

I just cant wait to see what happens with Wachovia, will be very interesting to see. I also think that we will see a collapse of the market value of the Swedish banks when the crisis really hits the Baltic countries. This is actually acknowledged in BusinessWeek. I'm so happy I'm in school at the moment - standing by the sidelines and waiting.

Great monday morning

Sitting in class and doing managerial accounting. We are going through activity based accounting. Its interesting and good, and it feels very usable - if I would end up in a financial-heavy role after the MBA.

I also found this great quote from A.P in San Fransisco:

"The government's commitment to spend up to $700 billion buying bad debts from ailing banks is likely to save some institutions that would have otherwise died, but analysts doubt it will be enough to avert a major shakeout."

It sort of sorts out what the bailout is actually about - and AP suggest a lot of bad banks are going to go bust.. the race has already started in Denmark with Roskilde Bank (Amagerbanken next?) - I wonder what will happen with the Swedish banks. I didn't know about the loans that they need to repay during 2009 (i just assume that will never happen).

Sunday and more work

I am currently sitting in the library.. After several days of rain we are now having a great day here in Oslo. The sun is shining, but its rather cold outside. I was up at around half past eight this morning, did some calculations .. and this "great" mind-map over the Chinese costmetics industry..

I have always thought that mind-maps is a great tool to remember a lot of data, and studying cases is a great way to practice drawing mind-maps.. I will definitely utilize this tool later in my professional career. Here is a link to a "free" mind-map generator.

The picture is taken at around half past eleven sunday. When I have time, Ill try to download the mind-map generator, and see how it works, the thing is.. i kind of like pen and paper.

The library, a saturday.

Yesterday I met up with some old friends.. Nothing extravagant. We had some beers at a local pub/bar in Oslo and then we went on to the sky bar in the SAS Radisson hotel here in Oslo.. it was quite nice. Im now in the library, reading up on some cases.. preparing a group discussion and so forth.

Saw that Wachovia - a bank that sold a lot its branches to Citi - now merges with Wells Fargo... well, what can you say.. Swedbank - the bank mentioned earlier in this blog... is going to repay approximately SEK 300 billion next year to the swedish government...

Free day: calm study day and visit

I gave a lecture today to my class mates regarding the calculations of GP-margin, EBITDA, EBIT and EAT and other very related stuff. I also wrote a case to this class, and we discussed some tips and trix to equity analysis. It seemed to be a success..

Now, Im sitting in the library and reading.. which is kind of nice and calm. A friend is on visit here in Oslo - so Im meeting up with him tonight.. Did I mention i slept until 8 o clock this morning? well, it was a fantastic morning.

A nice quote during class...

Thomas L.O during the class in strategy...
Teacher (T): "Which one of these factors are most important in the short or long term?"
Thomas L.O: "I would say that the socio-demographic part is the most important factor in the short and long term.."
Teacher: "What do you mean, in the short or the long term?"
Thomas L.O: "In the short.... and the long term"

... now thats a nice hedge, thank you very much...

The beginning of the end of the credit cruch?!

The news is full of information about the bail out plan that now is accepted. Could this be seen as the beginning of the end of the current credit crisis? Well, i have no idea.. i know to little about it. WSJ is reporting about the bill here - which increases the liquidity of the US financial market with approx 700 billion USD.

This graph by NY Times pretty much shows how much the financial firms have lost in equity value... Insane, that is a word that is appropriate.

My first official presentation in front of the class..

It seems as if our (group 4) presentation has been picked to be shown in front of the class tomorrow, which means that I have my first (official that is) presentation in front of the class. I think that will be a lot of fun :-)

Barneys model of competitive advantage and Porters value chain

We went through this model regarding sustainable competitive advantage. Really interesting and valuable tool to actually validate if a resource is a sustainable competitive advantage.

I have also added a picture of Porters value chain for the long linked technology.

New discussion about AA and SABRE

I am currently in a break and we are having one of the most interesting discussion of the MBA program (and in my entire academic career). We are discussing SABRE and the role of American Airlines... and how the airline industry has evolved.. deregulation, Alitalia (one of the most mis-managed companies in the world, which should be allowed to die) and a lot of other very very interesting stuff.

When, when will this financial crisis end?

An interesting fact - according to the San Fransisco Chronicle - IPOs hit its lowest level in this quarter in 30 years. Anyone thinking of going public in a non-liquid world? no, not really right.. Other rumors circulate around the fact that Glitnir is going to be purchased by Icelandic Landsbanki. A lot of VC's sitting around and hoping to cash in on their investments.. I guess thats not going to happen - not now anyway..

I read somewhere that the statistical facts says that we are not really in an actual depression - if you compare with the crisis in 1929 (anyhow).

Midnight oil #2 and marketing

Seems like this week is like a holiday in the worst salt mine imaginable - well, not that Im whipped to sleep every night.. its a lot of work... plus, this morning I saw the first rain here in Oslo.

Update: Currently doing some last minute panic reading for our marketing class and thinking about the issues with Deutsche Breuerei.. a family owned German brewery with serious cash constraints due to an international investment in a former Soviet republic.. very interesting case, and in my opinion a classic example of what happens when you finance your expansion plans with short term debt and current assets.

Very interesting discussion about Lexus activities in Souther California. Absolutely great.

Insane mega merger..

Another interesting merger emerged on NY Times business session. Citigroup is buying Wachovias branches of banks, making Citigroup into even a bigger giant only to be rivaled by two other banks in the U.S; Bank of America and JP Morgan Chase.

Apparently the value of deal is not disclosed, but Citi is taking over 42 billion USD (equal to ~ 240 billion SEK) out of Wachovias bad debt pool of 312 billion USD. Insurance from the FED is also acquired for 12 billion USD of preferred shares. On the upside, Citi gets a hold of Wachovias "good" debt as well - which amounts to 400 billion USD.

In comparison the banks involved in the Swedish banking crisis lost approx. 180 billion SEK (about 60 billion USD). How much is a billion USD? if you stack the quarters on top of each other, the stack would go to the moon...

Credit crunch...

I read a great post on the Becker-Posner blog today. It seems to sum up the current credit crunch quite well.

"Many lenders have so much of their capital tied up in mortgage-backed securities or other novel forms of capital that are difficult to value that they cannot attract new capital at a price that would enable the lender to continue in business. The sale of the securities would just expose their lack of value." - Richard Posner

A new week

So, a new week has started.. I am currently sitting in the class room preparing for a subject called "group processes". The weekend was great, but a lot of work. "Finished" off two cases in the group and initiated another - the outcome so far in my opinion? (6/10 i guess, if i rate my own work)

In the news.. banking giant Fortis seems to have done some extraordinary stupid deals (I mean, why not?). When will we see the stupid mistakes in Scandinavia? (well, disregarding the smaller Danish banks). My old - very old - employer Starbucks, has taken a lot of hits lately and Howard Schultz has announced that he is going to re-focus the organizations. I mean, you go to Starbucks for the nice coffee.. not to eat sweet buns and bad sandwiches.

Midnight oil

So, Im currently doing some interesting calculations on Deutsche Brauerei (Im probably spelling that wrong).. its soon half past twelve and Im doing Excel spreadsheets. Im kinda tired.. but something inside me thinks its quite fun. Anyhow... ... looking through the pictures again.. man, i look like a dork on almost all of them.

Pictures from last night - Patricias birthday

Maike, Patricia and Laura

Kalle (Carl S in the Star Wars conversations) and me

Erlend & Kalle, me in the background with Thomas and Karthik

Erlend, Kalle, Thomas, Karthik and meKarthik, me, Kalle, Rafael, Ranajays hand and Filipe

Going out.

A lot of friends from the class were out drinking yesterday. I was really tired when I went out.. and I was even more tired when I came home.. well, I think I went to bed at around 2 o clock. Im paying for that now.. really.. I need to be at school. ASAP!

... yet another very interesting chat conversation in the library...

Carl S says:
muddihadi muddihadi ikkihadi
Carl F says:
but how can they be jamming us if they dont know we're coming..... [sad look in Landos eyes]
Carl S says:
ITS A TRAP!!!
Carl F says:
"abort the mission"
Carl S says:
all ships, concentrate your fire on the super star destroyer
Carl F says:
he he he .

A crisis that never seems to end.

I am currently sitting the quiet part of the library, reading to cases for two hand-ins next week. One strategy case is called "Pearl River Piano" and is about a Chinese piano manufacturer that wants to compete with Steinway & Sons. The other one is fairly old, and is about Pacific Pride - an american gas station business with an IT-system from what seems to be the stone age.

In the news, which is really weird... JP Morgan Chase buys Washington Mutual - the second largest lender in the US and Swedish Swedbank is under attack. Didnt Swedbank have a operating profit of almost 9 bn SEK during their first 6 months of 2008? Then maybe... just maybe filing for bankruptcy is pretty farfetched - at the moment that is..

Guest lecturer from the US

We are currently having a guest lecture by Prof. James Thurber. He is currently here visiting the U.S Embassy in Norway and is here to talk to us about the US election process and the climate changes.

• James Thurber on Wikipedia

Short chat in the break done on MSN in the same classroom

Carl S says:

- "now watch the firepower of this fully ARMED and OPERATIONAL battlestation"
Carl F. says:
- "that blast came from the death star"
Carl F. says:
- !!!
Carl S says:
- thats no moon.....
Carl F. says:
- "we would last longer against them than against that death star"
Carl F. says:
- guess who!?
Carl S says:
- lando
Carl F. says:
- sweet

"New" explanation to the credit crunch..

I have found a new really good article/bloc explaining the current credit crunch.

• Wall Street Crisis: Stephen Schwarzmann explains it all

Stephen Schwarzmann is the Chairman of the Blackstone Group.

New case..

We are now doing another case. It's on an interesting company (well..) called Pearl River Piano. Its about a Chinese piano manufacturer and its fairly interesting.

Group class.

I am now sitting in a class where we discuss teams and team dynamic. I cannot judge if I will use this knowledge or not.. It feels relevant, but I can't stop pondering on next weeks work - which will surpass last week. I think we have three group hand-ins (Strategy, IT Management with Espen Andersen and Micro).

Here are some nice articles on the Wall Street crash aftermath (which the Swedish newspapers are terrible at reporting.. including DI.se/E24

• The Bailout: Public Angers, Private Talks - in BusinessWeek
• Goldman gets Buffet Aid - from Bloomberg

(interesting that Warren Buffet purchases a big chunk of G.S - 4.5 %, with the option to increase this piece in 5 years to 9 %.. i wonder what goes on in Lloyd Blankfeins head)

Download a MP3 from the Guardian where William Keegan describes the credit crunch and the bail-out package made by Paulson and the Fed.

Yesterday and preparing for a case in marketing

I am now overdue on two books that I have in my locker - ill have to deliver them back to the library.. We are having yet another guest lecturer today in Management of IT. We had a lot of material to read for this session. Two cases covering the knowledge management models at Andersen Consulting (Accenture) and McKinsey. Andersen's model seems very similar to how we have it at IBM. Very network based and impossible to search through.

Done with my tickets..

I should add that I have bought my tickets to China... Im flying with Swiss for SEK ~ 6 400. Not that bad to be honest (return ticket to Shanghai, from Stockholm - via Zürich).

Today has been a weird day. We have had two guest lecturers.. An old BI MBA told us about Intellectual Property Rights and now we are having a class discussion about Morgan Motor company and what kind of resources that are really utilized to create competitive advantage. I would like to finish up my reading for this week.

The last picture is of Sheremetyevo 2 - the international airport located in Moscow.

Back in Norway.

So, Im now back in Norway. I am currently in the accounting class.. I was late to a case discussion on the Morgan Motor Company, but my group-friends didnt seem to mind that much. I am very tired after being in Stockholm, which was very nice. I studied until half past ten yesterday... Nice with an early evening :-)

Agreement with Mannheim...

I dont know if I have forgotten to add this, but in the second semester we are allowed to go on a short "exchange" with the Mannheim Business School where you can study parallel on their MBA-program.. which some rankings are very good. Anyhow, I remember seeing some very interesting course - particularly in marketing and negotiations.

It also seems as if i have heavily underestimated next weeks work load.. ... ...